It did not take long to satisfy the curiosity of the neighbourhood on all these points. Richard Westwood's lawyer produced in due course a will which the former had made the year before, and it became plain from this document that the testator was a wealthy man--that is to say, wealthy from the standpoint of Brackenshire; though, of course, in the estimation of Lancashire or Chicago the sums which he bequeathed represented a competency only one degree removed from absolute penury. Something like two hundred thousand pounds were distributed in the will, but the distribution was made on the simplest principle. After a few legacies of an unimportant character to some cousins, his clerks and servants. Richard Westwood left all his property in trust for his brother Claude, should the said Claude be found to be alive within five years from the date of the will. But should no proof be forthcoming that he was alive within that period, everything was to go to Agnes Louise Mowbray, of The Knoll, for her absolute use. People opened their eyes when they became acquainted with the provisions of the will. So many years had passed since the departure of Claude Westwood, it was quite forgotten, except by a few persons, that there was a woman awaiting his return. There were some people, however, who said that the character of Richard Westwood's will proved that he had been in love with Miss Mowbray. They never failed to add that they had suspected it all along. CHAPTER X. |Cyril Mowbray did not seem to feel quite as jubilant as he might have done, when it was proved beyond the possibility of doubt, that Claude was alive. The income that would be his when he reached the age of twenty-five was a small one, and quite insufficient to allow of his keeping three hunters and driving a coach, to say nothing of that two-hundred-ton yacht upon which he had set his heart. He considered that he was, on the whole, very hardly dealt with by Fate, for he felt convinced that he was meant by Nature to be a country gentleman in affluent circumstances and without need to take thought for all the unlet farms that might be on his property. He considered it especially hard that he should be cheated out of his money--that was how he put it--by the reappearance of Claude. He had great confidence in his own ability to persuade his sister to part with her money. To whom should she give her money if not to her own brother, he inquired of such persons as he took into his confidence on the subject of his grievances. His confidence in his capacity to get his sister's money into his possession was but too well-founded. During the year of idleness that followed his being sent down from the University, he had been a terrible burden to Agnes, for it was in vain that she pleaded with him to seek to qualify himself for some employment in which a University degree was not necessary; he refused to listen to her, saying that he was fit for nothing but the life of a country gentleman.